When the End is Near

Decided to do a short writeup of my trip as a whole since I’m pretty free at the moment with my roomies out. It’s 4more climbing days left, 5 more to going back home.

I really grow to like Yangshuo alot. Probably more than all the places I’ve been to so far.

I love Krabi for its laidback lifestyle, the close proximity to the sea and the several crags it has to offer to climbers.

The whole atmosphere is very relaxed and a good escapade from the irritating rat race lifestyle in Singapore.

I love Perlis for the huge white cave and the trek leading to Belly Button Window.

I love Ipoh only for the food. I hate the climbing.

I love KL for Camp 5 and food. Ok so-so with Batu Caves but I hate the mozzies.

Yangshuo is very much a touristy area. So all the time you’ll be met with shopkeepers soliciting with you trying to get you to buy their goods and offer you cheap accoms and special tourist rides. It feels like a pseudo culture mainly forged around pleasing tourists. I don’t really like this point. It definitely lacks the laidback lifestyle of Krabi which kind of suits my personality better.

I’m done with the bad point on to the good points.

Food and accoms very cheap. Food not more than 10SGD a day, accoms 10SGD per night (discounted price cos of Jonathan and Liu Li’s intro)

People: 80 – 90% of the people here are really friendly and nice. I’ve come to realise that Chinese from different parts of China have different personalities/traits/cultures. For example, some foreigners in NUS and SG are plain rude, snobbish, loud and unpleasant. But it’s really different here. Of course there are still exceptions but still acceptable. Women here are really tough and ‘hardcore’ quoting Tim. They’re really the domineering type in general and I don’t think I can win a quarrel with them.

Scenery:
The scenery of a climbing crag is actually quite important to me. It makes the whole process of climbing more pleasant and enjoyable. To me, they’re almost as important as doing hard shit itself. I feel the climbing process and send is less enjoyable without the beautiful scenery around us.

Which kind of explains why I hate going to one place only all the time. True I’ve got alot of projects at one place but I’ve seen every part of the landscape at that place. That’s why I condemn Batu Caves and so-so with Dairy Farm cos I got no other natural places to climb in SG. After visiting almost more than half the crags in YS, I think I’m done with Asia. I’ll be looking at Australia next for exploration and adventure before going back to Krabi and YS solely for hard sending. For now, my want to see the outside world supersedes my need to do hard climbs. I’m sure there’s sth hard everywhere so there isn’t much of an issue 🙂

Climbs:
I really like the climbs here better than all other places because I feel most of the routes/climbs are well thought out for its potential and the moves involved. It’s not like Krabi where “Hey there’s still space on this wall so let’s just bolt a route” and end up a whole bunch of routes clustered together all within close proximity. Ok la some are really good but some really feels it’s almost exactly like the route beside it just cut and pasted. Perhaps YS will be like that in the future, but I like it the way it is for now, and the classics I’ve tried are really really nice and well thought out.

I’ve been climbing everyday and get to visit different crags almost everyday which is really good and fulfilling for a first time trip. I get to see different styles and faces and I’ve never tried climbing on.